Introducing Critical Bitch FM

Turn off that radio station playing in your head

What follows is an extract from my book The A to Z of Better Body Image: 26 ways To Look Great and Feel More Confident.

You can read the whole book here as a gift from me

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C is for CRITICAL BITCH FM

Critical Bitch FM is the radio station playing in your head.

It is a radio station that has more powerful marketing tactics than Facebook, Google and Amazon put together.

With Critical Bitch FM, once you are tuned in, there’s no escape. It plays 24/7 in your head. Everyone else you know also has their mindset permanently tuned into Critical’s transmission.

What does this radio station sound like?

Well, if it had a show list, this is what it would be:

Never Enough

The flagship show of Critical Bitch FM. Never Enough provides you, the lucky listener, with all the inner put downs you’ll ever need to stop yourself upping your game in life.

The most popular ones are:
* You can’t get away with those jeans anymore. Go and change.

* No, your bum doesn’t look big in that. More like humungous. Gigantic. You better throw in the towel and just change your name to Enormica right now.

* He will NEVER fancy you until you lose (insert any amount of weight here; the number is irrelevant). Yes, I know millions of men routinely fall in love with women who do not look like supermodels, but that could never happen to you. You’re different. Unlike them, you can never be enough to be loved with all your flaws.

(*** Logic, like my ability to speak, fails me here. Those millions of women in relationships with these men are also listening to Critical Bitch FM 24/7 ***)

* Don’t even think about buying that red dress. Anything except black makes you look like a beached whale. OK, the truth is you look like a beached whale anyway, but black hides it best. What gives you the right to think you can stand out from the crowd?

Because You’re Not Worth It

Fake personal development chat show based on the premise that you need to buy beauty products in order to achieve self-esteem. A thin veneer of fluffy and saccharine-sweet advice is plastered over the underlying message: you are worthless if you don’t own the recommended hair, make up and skin care products.

The Easy Excuses Show

A bit of light relief, The Easy Excuses Show offers mental escape plans for those times when you really, really want that chocolate bar, or the prospect of going to the gym feels like climbing Everest. For example:
* Oh, sod it. The diet starts tomorrow.
* I’ve had a tough day and I deserve a treat.
* Go on, it’s only polite.

This show is sponsored by various manufacturers of high fat/high sugar foods. While the excuses given appear to offer a temporary escape from the mental torture of shows like Never Enough, The Easy Excuses Show works hand in hand with the rest of the radio station to fulfil its mission of disempowering women everywhere; keeping their lives small by persuading them they are too big.

What can we do when such toxic nonsense is playing night and day in every woman’s head (it’s also got a rapidly growing male listenership)?

Turn off that radio station.

You do this by first of all acknowledging it’s playing, that its not just The Truth for you to bow down and silently accept.

Interesting fact about Critical Bitch FM: it was founded by Sabotage You, who we shall meet later in this book.

Even more interesting fact: Sabotage You is not actually out to ruin your life. She’s trying to help – she’s just got it really, really wrong.

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IS Critical Bitch FM